Middle East

Shiite Cleric Ends Absence From Iraq With Fiery Speech

By JOHN F. BURNS

May 26, 2007

BAGHDAD, May 25 — The populist Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr appeared in public for the first time in months on Friday after what American officials have described as a lengthy period of refuge in Iran. He delivered a fiercely anti-American sermon and offered himself in a new guise as a nationalist intent on bridging the divide between Iraq’s warring communities of Shiites and Sunnis.

Flanked by bodyguards and hailed by weeping loyalists, the 33-year-old Mr. Sadr made his reappearance at a mosque in Kufa, a Shiite holy city 100 miles south of Baghdad. The mosque has been Mr. Sadr’s favorite redoubt since he emerged early in the Iraqi conflict as the leader of the Mahdi Army, a powerful anti-American militia that has made him a crucial player in the struggle for power in Iraq.

“No, no, no to Satan! No, no, no to America! No, no, no to occupation! No, no, no to Israel!” Mr. Sadr told about 1,000 worshipers, frequently mopping his brow in the 110-degree heat of Iraq’s early summer.

He renewed earlier demands for a timetable for an American troop withdrawal, saying the Iraqi government “should not extend the occupation even for a single day.” But he avoided setting a deadline, perhaps because of widespread fears among Iraqi Shiites that Iraq’s new Shiite-dominated army and police are far from ready to stand alone against the groups aligned with Al Qaeda and the Baathist die-hards who have driven the Sunni insurgency.

Mr. Sadr coupled his call for an American pullout with an offer of a new alliance with Iraq’s minority Sunnis, thousands of whom have been killed or driven from their homes over the past year by Shiite death squads. Many of the death squads have been offshoots of the Mahdi Army that have struck in revenge for a relentless Sunni insurgent campaign of bombings aimed at Shiite civilians gathering at markets, mosques, weddings and elsewhere.

Mr. Sadr blamed the Americans for the fighting among Iraqis, saying, “the invader has separated us,” Shiites and Sunnis, and that “unity is power and division is weakness.” Casting aside for the moment his oft-stated claim to be the only Shiite leader capable of offering Shiites protection against Sunni insurgents, he said he was “extending his hand” to Sunnis and to Iraqi Christians, a small and scattered community that has been reduced by thousands of families in the wave of Iraqis fleeing abroad.

He said he had ordered the Mahdi Army not to attack Sunnis and to end clashes with the Shiite-dominated Iraqi Army and police, which he described as “our brothers.” But his strongest appeal was for a new alliance of Shiites, Sunnis and Christians. “I want to say now that the blood of Sunnis is forbidden to everyone,” he said. “They are our brothers in religion and in nationality.”

He continued, “And let our Christian brothers know that Islam is a friend to our minorities and to other faiths, and seeks dialogue with them.”

According to American officials familiar with intelligence reports, Mr. Sadr fled Iraq in January for sanctuary in Iran. The Americans have suggested that the cleric, in fear of arrest or assassination, may have sought refuge in Iran before the American troop buildup ordered in January by President Bush.

Mr. Sadr’s spokesmen insisted Friday that he had remained in Iraq all along.

The cleric has matched his rare public appearances in the four years since the American-led invasion with an elusive politics, juggling alliances and enmities in a way that has made him a formidable and unpredictable force.

The pattern was evident again on Friday, when he left political opponents guessing why he chose to resurface now, just as the influx of nearly 30,000 additional American troops is moving to its peak and American commanders are reviewing long-deferred plans for a broad sweep into Sadr City, the vast Baghdad district that has been the base for much of Mr. Sadr’s political support.

One theory that has gained widespread currency is Baghdad is that Mr. Sadr, during his reported absence in Iran, saw his power in Iraq eroding. During those months, Shiites suffered ceaseless suicide bombings, some of them claiming scores of victims. Inevitably, the cleric’s absence led to talk among Shiites of his having chosen personal safety over his responsibilities to the people he claims to lead.

In addition, critical parts of the Mahdi Army have been gradually dismembered as American and Iraqi forces staged raid after raid on the militia’s cells, especially in Sadr City. The raids have had an opaque dimension politically, with American commanders and senior officials in the government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, a political ally of Mr. Sadr’s, contending that most if not all of the dozens of “terrorist leaders” killed and captured in the raids have been from “rogue” and “criminal” groups that have broken with Mr. Sadr.

For Mr. Sadr, the formula has had a face-saving quality, and, American commanders say, has helped eliminate elements of the Mahdi Army that were beyond the cleric’s control and posed the threat of future challenges to his leadership.

Mr. Sadr’s resurfacing comes at a time when mounting pressures in Congress and public opinion in the United States for an American troop withdrawal have led Iraq’s feuding political parties to look beyond the time when the American military presence will be the decisive element in the quest for political power.

Mr. Sadr, some Iraqi politicians believe, may have seen this as the moment to make his claim as a nationalist leader, something he has made moves toward before, only to have the attacks on Sunni civilians by Mahdi Army death squads define him as a mercilessly sectarian figure, at least in the minds of many Sunnis.

On Friday, the American military command announced the deaths of six United States soldiers in five separate attacks on Thursday, including two who were killed by a roadside bomb in western Baghdad and four others who were killed in attacks north of Baghdad in Salahuddin, Diyala and Nineveh Provinces.

According to a tally on icasualties.org, a Web site that lists Pentagon death announcements, the latest deaths came on top of 90 other American service members killed during May, up to Wednesday.

With the total almost certain to rise above 100 before the month ends, May seems set to follow April as one of the worst months of the war for deaths among American troops.

Also on Friday, the British military command in the southern city of Basra said a joint raid conducted by British and Iraqi special forces had killed a senior Mahdi Army commander in the city.

The British command identified the man as Abu Qader and said he had been shot while “resisting arrest” during the raid on Mr. Sadr’s headquarters in the city. Reuters quoted a British military spokesman as saying that Mr. Qader was suspected of involvement in planting roadside bombs, weapons trafficking, assassinations and participating in attacks on British troops.

Ali Adeeb contributed reporting from Baghdad, and Iraqi employees of The New York Times from Kufa and Basra, Iraq.